This invention relates to the field of voice response help systems and, more particularly, to a voice help system that is particularly adapted for use in small appliances such as telephones and kitchen use devices.
Newly purchased products come with highly detailed manuals, however, experience indicates that users rarely read the manuals and the detailed troubleshooting instructions that are contained therein. Accordingly, telephone service help offered by manufacturers receive many calls that are unnecessary, as the answers to the questions that are posed are already available in the equipment manuals.
The prior art includes a number of teachings regarding voice synthesized help systems for computerized apparatus.
In U.S. Pat. No. 5,583, 801, a sewing machine tester directs a test via synthesized voice commands which a technician hears over phones plugged into a test unit. The technician uses a keypad to input responses to a processor which controls the test unit. If the test unit determines that a measured value is within specifications, the test unit directs the technician to make a next measurement. Thus, the processor follows the flow of a program which enables the technician to be audibly directed through the test procedure.
In U.S. Pat. No. 5,127,005, a fault diagnosis expert system is described wherein a user interface provides a user with questions and responses regarding the state of a machine""s problem. The system further includes an inference part which infers the cause of a machine""s trouble and outputs the inference results to the user. U.S. Pat. No. 4,697,243 describes an expert system having a knowledge base of troubleshooting information for an elevator system. The expert system enables a repairman to sequence through a series of the tests, with the expert system requesting additional data that is not available to the knowledge base of the system. The expert system, with the additional information, is thus enabled to more efficiently aid the repairman.
A voice help guide is needed for use with small appliances, such as telephones, kitchen implements and other consumer devices. Further, such a voice help guide should enable the user to sequence through a series of queries in a fast and efficient manner, without having to step through each query, in sequence.
Accordingly, it is an object of this invention to provide an improved voice help guide for use with telephones, kitchen implements and other consumer devices.
It is another object of this invention to provide an improved voice help guide which enables the user to rapidly step through a series of troubleshooting queries.
It is yet another object of this invention to provide an improved voice help guide which requires minimal storage of data for its implementation.
A user appliance incorporating the invention includes a non-volatile memory for storing (i) a series of queries regarding operating problems that may be encountered in operating the user appliance; and (ii) a series of instructions on how to overcome the operating problems. Switching devices are provided which enable the user to input xe2x80x9cyesxe2x80x9d or xe2x80x9cnoxe2x80x9d responses to the queries. The appliance further includes a controller that is responsive to an input from the user to cause a broadcast of the queries and instructions via a voice synthesizer. The controller further enables the user to skip certain of the queries by actuation of a switching device to input a xe2x80x9cnoxe2x80x9d response to the controller.